Does your organisation have Scottish Living Wage
accreditation? (£8.45/hr)

1. Current approaches to managing later-life
working

In your experience as employers, what are the key challenges
associated with an ageing workforce?

Can you identify any opportunities that an ageing workforce
offer your business/organisation?

What are the implications of the abolition of the default
retirement age for workforce planning in your organisation?

What currently happens when an employee is reaching their 60s
or close to what would have been the default retirement age?
PROBE:

Any discussion of retirement? Who initiates?

"Bridge retirement?"

Redundancy?

Are you experiencing any issues around capacity to work among
older employees, such as health problems or performance issues,
or not?
If yes:

How do you manage them?

Is this an issues that line managers are able/willing to
tackle?

What is your current approach towards training & career
development for older workers - by which I mean those over the
age of 50?

Any difference in approach for those aged over 65?

Do you think any new initiatives are needed in areas such as
training and career development for older workers?

Do you have any particular policies in place to support older
workers?
PROMPT:

for example, to deal with issues around caring
responsibilities or health?

Do you have a flexible working policy?

How does this work in practice?

How often is it used by older workers? For what sort of
circumstances?

Does anyone have any stories to tell from their business that
describe what you think is innovative or good practice in terms
of retaining older workers?

2. Recruitment of older workers

When it comes to recruiting workers, does your organisation
have an informal age cut-off?

What proportion of applicants for new posts are over 50 years
old, roughly speaking?

Do you as an employer do anything in particular to attract
older applicants?

3. Retirement & pensions

Do you have a flexible retirement scheme?

How does it operate?

Any difference in take up by employee grade or gender?

Do you think there will continue to be a place for schemes
such as voluntary early retirement & voluntary severance?

Amongst your workforce, are there any employees looking for
early retirement?

Do you think that pension changes will affect all of your
employees equally, or do you think that it may have a greater
impact on particular sections of your workforce than others?
PROBE: gender/grade of employee

4. Desired support from Scottish Government

Do you think that there is anything that the Scottish
Government could or should do to support employers in the
recruitment, management and retention of older workers?

Are you aware of any initiatives such as the Business
Pledge/Carer Positive Awards/Family Friendly Partnership?

5. Finishing up

Generally speaking, how important is age as an
HR concern?

To finish: Thinking about all of the things we
have talked about today, how would you sum up your views as
employers regarding extended working